Aloha From Mars: Swab's Motion Designer Cape

[Match-Boy]

Aloha,

I need a little help with my motion designer cape. I have two problems happning that you will see in this animation.

http://www.match-boy.com/SwapMDJumpWEB.mov
The movie is quicktime with animation compression.

One: The cape mesh fractures leaving cracks in the surface and a incorrect shado as light passes through.

Two: The cape is attached to the front part of the frame and drape over the back part of the cape. Yet the cape passes through that back frame piece. I have the normals flipped so that they face towards the frame. The collision works fine for wraping around the bodysurfaces. But it just does not want to work on the frane surface

If any one can help me to get this worked out I would appreciate it. Hopefully the md setting wont kill my machine. If any one also know of any great tutorials on motion designer point me to them.

Also:
Do wind effects work on motion designed objects or must you use the enviorment tab?

And can you have subdivision on and still work MD?

We should start posting on these forums a Lightwave resource section. So people can post their settings and what they do for Motion designer, Ik, Surfaces, Skytracer, Hypervoxels and effects and every other thing they can think of. I would like to see other peoples cloth examples, surface settings and hypervoxel designs. Let me know what you think. It would be a nice way to build a users preset library.

Attached below is a frame from the animation with the offending parts circled.

If you want to see more pictures of the characters and animations see some of my other posts or go to my site at

www.match-boy.com/aloha.html


Thanks
Matt

[iluvatar]

long time ago i last used motion designer, but i'll try to remember here: subdivision should work with motion designer, but you may change the "subdivision order" option (see object propery panel, geometry tab)... this could solve the shadow problem too, cause of non-planar poly's created by the motion... try it and let me know too please, cause it's a long time ago for me!

[Hurben]

Yes it's fine to use subpatched objects, like iluvatar said, object properties > subpatch order > after motion (or last if you prefer)

Alternatively, you can freeze your object in Modeler, make sure it's tripled, then you won't get any nasty non-planars.

I'm not too experienced with MD but I know increasing the collision radius may help. Also do a search on the old Newtek forums for motion designer : .here (http://www.newtek.com/community/discus/nest.html) .. the MD plug hasn't changed in a long time so the information there will still be relevant..

Good luck..

[Match-Boy]

Thank you for the advice guys.

I will run a test of the cape subpatched tonight to see how it goes. It makes sense why it is fracturing now.

I figured out the wind problem. Wind effects react to MD.

If I cant get the collision to work on the back part of the frame I can always weld points to gether to hold it in place. But I would rather get it to work.

I'll keep you all posted on how it goes.

Matt

[ivanjs]

Hey-
Though you're looking more for feedback on the MD aspects, from an animation standpoint, the cape changes direction too soon. It shouldn't flip up until he starts coming down. Right now, it starts too soon.

john
http://homepage.mac.com/johnselvia/